


Stars of Twilight Fair

by orphan_account



Series: Agents and Ministers of Grace [1]
Category: Agent Carter (TV)
Genre: Canon Compliant, F/F, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-26
Updated: 2015-01-26
Packaged: 2018-03-09 02:42:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3233234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This series is going to attempt to track canon with a new short fic each week, essentially supplying a version of Peggy and Angie's relationship as if it were happening off-camera.  At present, I'm just attempting to get caught up to where we are now before the next episode airs on Tuesday.  </p><p>Please enjoy Part 1, in which we learn about Peggy's affection for Wordsworth.  I hope to post Part 2 by tomorrow, which will cover the events of Episode 3.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stars of Twilight Fair

Peggy sat at her desk, staring into a cup of half-cold coffee, her eyes looking through (rather than at) the reports spread in front of her.  She was still fretting over having allowed Angie to talk her into applying at Griffith House.  Given the fate of her last roommate, she could hardly be blamed for not wanting to drag Angie, or any of those other girls for that matter, into something dangerous or deadly.  Angie was certainly spunky and street smart, in her way, but she had no idea what kind of people were trailing Peggy, and the last thing Peggy wanted to do was make her a target.  But when Angie had looked at her with those clear blue eyes, and suggested that maybe Peggy wasn't interested because she didn't want to be neighbors with her, Peggy caved.

She felt absurdly protective of the girl, more so than the normal sense of duty that she felt toward the general public.  It was that protectiveness that motivated her the other day when she threatened to kill one of Angie's ruder customers with a fork if he didn't shape up and start being kinder to the sweet little waitress from Brooklyn.  The terrified jackass left the best tip Angie had ever seen.

It felt good to have motivated a bit of respect in a chap like that, and she wasn't the least bit appalled with herself for it.  If nothing else, it made her feel a little better about the distinct lack of respect that she seemed to command from her alleged colleagues (excepting Sousa, possibly, although she wasn't entirely clear what his motivations were).

The fact was, apart from her concerns for Angie's safety, there was nothing she could imagine that would be more delightful than living next door to her, sharing breakfasts and late night drinks.  Unbidden, her mind tossed up an image of a sleepy Angie, exhausted from a long day at the Automat, delicately sliding a stocking off of her leg, which was visible thanks to her bathrobe hanging slightly open.  

 _Bloody hell, Carter,_ she grumbled internally.   _Where did that come from?_

"Carter!" Dooley barked, sounding annoyed, as if this were probably the third time he'd called her name.

Peggy snapped to.  "Sorry?"

"Briefing room in five."  He shook his head with visible irritation.  "I don't know where you get this reputation as a hot-shot."

Peggy bit her tongue and collected her papers.

 

***

 

Dinners at the Automat were becoming an anchor of sanity.  But it wasn't the underwhelming roast that brought her back (she could taste that it hadn't been done properly, with wine), but the presence of the waitress with her working-class charms.  She tried to imagine as she sat in her booth, pretending to read her tattered copy of Wordsworth, who Angela Martinelli would be if she'd been English.  She pictured her in a black wool coat, cracking wise in a Bristol accent as she left her shift at the pub in Camden town, strolling the wet streets at nightfall to catch a ride in her brother's lorry back to the suburbs.

A plate descended onto the table and the girl descended into the seat across from her.  

"Whatcha readin', English?" Angie asked.

Peggy laid the little book aside and looked at her friend's face, so warm, so interested in everything she had to say.  "Ah, just Wordsworth.  An old favorite."

"You probably used to read a lot of that type of stuff in your fancy prep school, right?"

Peggy nodded.  "Absolutely.  I have half of it committed to memory at this point, but I still like to read the words and feel them without having to remember them."

Angie looked a little confused but gamely tried to get her head around it.  "It's easier to enjoy it if you don't have to think about it."

Peggy smiled.  "Yes, sort of.  Some of them, I don't need to think..."  She cast her dark eyes upward for a moment, pulling a well-worn favorite from her memory:

_"She was a phantom of delight_   
_When first she gleamed upon my sight;_   
_A lovely apparition, sent_   
_To be a moment's ornament;_

_Her eyes as stars of twilight fair;_   
_Like twilight's, too, her dusky hair_   
_But all things else about her drawn_   
_From May-time and the cheerful dawn;_

_A dancing shape, an image gay,_   
_To haunt, to startle, and waylay."_

Angie looked as though someone had reached into her chest, grabbed her heart, and twisted it,  "Gosh, Peg, that's real pretty.  You know that one by heart, huh?"

Peggy nodded, looking at the little sparkles in Angie's pale eyes, the play of the light on her perfectly smooth, dark hair.  "It's my favorite."

She stared a moment into that heart-rent gaze, feeling an odd warmth in her chest and throat.  She hadn't felt this way around a girl since... well, since Paris, at the start of the war.  Angie's manager started hollering for her to see to the other customers, and she sped away.  Peggy pushed her roast around with her fork, apparently clearing her plate although she had no memory of doing so.  The only memory she retained when she thought of her dinner later that night was of Angie, whipping from table to table, the slim, shimmering shape that brightened whatever corner of the Automat she happened to be standing in.  

 

****

  



End file.
